Julie: She fixed an attendance problem nobody was calling an attendance problem.

Huntington High serves more than 1,600 students on a large campus with a limited number of bathrooms. When a student unexpectedly needed a period product, the only option was a long walk to the main office, an embarrassing ask in front of staff, and a late slip on the way back. By then she'd already missed part of class, and the fastest fix was often to call for a ride home. Those absences showed up in the attendance data as ordinary missed days. Nearly 1 in 4 U.S. students struggle to afford products, and 39% say they can't do their best schoolwork without them (State of the Period, 2025). Nobody had connected the two numbers.

Julie designed a period-product access project at Huntington High. She cold-outreached Aunt Flow to learn what a school partnership takes, priced the same program through a locally owned business, and presented both options to school and county administrators with the absenteeism research attached. She finished by designing a restocking workflow through a special-needs program, turning maintenance into paid workforce-skills practice.

• Cold Outreach
• Sourcing & Vendor Comparison
• Research
• Stakeholder Presentation
• Service Design
• Critical Thinking

The thinking behind the work — the part employers and community partners recognize right away.

• Design Thinking

  She started by walking the problem herself. A campus of 1,600 students, too few bathrooms, and a long hike to the main office meant students were missing class, getting a late slip, and sometimes just calling for a ride home. The product wasn't the solution; removing the friction was.

• Systems Thinking

  She didn't stop at "buy more products." She followed the problem into the attendance data, into the supply chain, and into who'd have to keep the dispensers full after she graduated.

• Shared Value

  The local vendor got a recurring account, the special-needs program got paid skills practice, and the school got attendance back. Nobody was doing anyone a favor.

• Introduced herself to a national supplier and learned the partnership requirements firsthand.
• Connected period-product access to attendance data the school was already collecting.
• Built a side-by-side cost and logistics comparison of a national provider and a local vendor.
• Presented both options to school and county administrators instead of pushing one answer.
• Designed a restocking workflow that doubled as workforce-skills practice for a special-needs program.
• Left behind a program that keeps running without her.

• A story with a real decision behind it: two options, one recommendation, named administrators in the room.
• A sourcing comparison she can walk a hiring manager through line by line.
• Contacts at a national brand, a local business, and a county office who know her name.

• References from school and county administrators who watched her present.
• A relationship with a local business owner who now has a recurring account.
• A credible answer to "tell me about a time you influenced people with no authority."

“Send the introduction before you have the plan. The first conversation is what tells you which plan is even possible.”

Design Your Own Internship is the framework Julie used to turn everyday access into experience worth showing.